'Six Legs, No Heart': Local comic artist pens book with plenty of chills, thrills

Brian Rhodes doesn't think of himself as a graphic-novel artist or as a comic-book artist, really. It's not a one-or-the-other situation for him, he said.

But his new book, "Six Legs, No Heart," has hallmarks of both.

The cover shows a single hand emerging from a mass of cockroaches, and while it sounds vile, there's a lot more to the story, Rhodes said.

"It's about ordinary people facing extraordinary bug problems," he said.

Rhodes and his wife, Amanda, were in a situation years ago that has some parallels to the storyline of "Six Legs, No Heart," which Brian Rhodes calls "semi-autobiographical."

"Six Legs, No Heart" is seen on a drawing table in Brian Rhodes' home studio Tuesday.BEN MATTHEWS

In the book, a young couple has peculiar neighbors who mysteriously disappear, but after their disappearance, it becomes obvious the real inhabitants of the house are cockroaches of various sizes.

"Many are of supernatural size," Rhodes said.

With the house's human inhabitants gone, the roaches go looking for a new food source, and they find the intrepid couple appealing.

"Hilarity ensues," Rhodes said with a wry smile.

"We had actual neighbors who were in reality a bit peculiar" a few years back, Rhodes said. Their house has a neighbor on only one side, and the houses sit close together, maybe 6 or 8 feet apart.

Once those neighbors were evicted, Rhodes said, he and Amanda discovered the house next door was infested with cockroaches.

"Hundreds of thousands of cockroaches," he said. "It was an absolute mess."

While the exterminators were working, Rhodes said, he lined the exterior of their house facing next door with glue traps.

They caught thousands that way, he said.

That got him thinking.

"I think there's a story here I need to get down," he told himself.

In the fall of 2015, he started writing and storyboarding, and the following summer, he started lining pages, doing panel layouts, working on principal drawing.

"I went at a decent pace until the holidays hit," he said, "then a big push in January, February, March, to have the book ready for Cape Comic Con."

Rhodes has been a presence at Cape Comic Con for several years now, as an artist and a volunteer. His previous series, "Mike and the Ninja," followed down-on-his-luck Mike, who stumbles into a partnership with Stu the Ninja. Three collections and a website chronicle their adventures.

Rhodes said the story of "Mike and the Ninja" is done, but he's always working on a website redesign.

He was 16 when he started with the concept, he said, and the logo and story did a lot of evolving.

Big Skink Tales is Rhodes' production company, although he refers to it as his work's "umbrella."

"I try to do some stuff on Big Skink Tales' Facebook and Instagram pages," he said, and he regularly posts drawings and other projects he's working on.

Rhodes is a fan of science fiction, classic pro wrestling, video games and other aspects of pop culture from the 1980s and '90s, and he said he tries to use references to what he likes.

"I kind of think you have to have fun making your art, because otherwise, your heart won't be in it," Rhodes said. "If you're trying to sell out, to write what you think will be popular with people, you won't be getting any enjoyment out of it."

He names among his influences everyone from "The Simpsons" creator Matt Groening to Ben Edlund, creator of "The Tick," who's gone on to work on several other projects. Another favorite, Scott Kurtz, writes the webcomic "PvP."

But at his heart, Rhodes said, he's about writing what he likes to read about, and he hopes others will be interested, too.

"Six Legs, No Heart" is available digitally on Comixology, and Rhodes will be appearing this weekend at SEMOCon at the Black River Coliseum in Poplar Bluff, Missouri.

mniederkorn@semissourian.com

(573) 388-3630

Pertinent address:

301 S. 5th St., Poplar Bluff, Mo.